


Fangs

by StarsGarters



Category: The Purge (Movies), The purge Anarchy - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-12
Updated: 2017-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-14 07:59:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11778795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarsGarters/pseuds/StarsGarters
Summary: A Vampire Alternate Universe of the film Purge Anarchy.





	1. Chapter 1

Ellen pulled the hash brown, green chili pepper and cheese casserole out of the oven. It was golden brown, crispy along the edges. It was her traditional Purge Night casserole, something warm and comforting to offset the unspeakable horrors taking place outside their front door. Her cat, Mr. Boots, wound about her ankles begging for a scrap. Ellen snuck a cheese crumb for the kitty and was rewarded with a warm rumble of a purr. The little black cat bounded off in triumph, collar jingling.

It was five minutes to the commencement of the annual Purge. Ellen wondered absently who she’d miss in the morning as she rode the bus on her commute. Last year there was a corpse on the front steps of her office, she’d stepped over the body. What else could you do? It was the law. You hid, you Purged or you died. She put the oven mitts on the counter. “Casserole’s done.”

Her husband of ten years, Carl, grunted in acknowledgment from the next room. It was the most he’d said all day. Purge Night made everyone edgy, Ellen thought.She couldn’t blame his surliness on anything else tonight. All their neighbors had left for the more civilized suburbs, but Carl had insisted on staying. On making a point. “I’ll get the salad ready. Check the door okay?”

The door opened and Ellen heard a muffled curse. “Oh goddamn it!”

“What’s wrong?” Ellen set the lettuce down.

“Your goddamn stupid cat just ran out the door. Go get it so I don’t have to listen to you worry about it all night!” Carl barked.

Ellen shot her husband a dirty look. “Why are you so careless?” She walked out onto the front stoop in her housecoat, apron and slippers. “Mr. Boots! Puss puss! Here kitty—“ Carl put his hands on the back of her shoulders and shoved her down the steps. Ellen stumbled, fell. Blood ran down her shins and she looked back in shock at her husband.

“It’s cheaper than a divorce. I hate your cat and your fucking _casserole_.” Then he shut the door. Ellen’s mouth fell open. It was a joke. It had to be a joke. Then she heard the deadbolts latch with leaden clunks that made her stomach lurch. _One_ — _two_ — _three_. She scrambled up the steps, losing a fuzzy slipper and pounded on the door. “Carl! Carl! It’s not funny! Let me in!”She peered in the peephole and saw the lights flick off. She heard music start to blast, drowning out her cries. “Please! Please let me in!”

" _This is your Emergency Broadcast System announcing the commencement of the Annual Purge. At the siren, all crime, including murder, will be legal for 12 hours. All emergency services will be suspended. Your government thanks you for your participation."_ The sirens wailed.  Ellen sank to her bloody knees, eyes wide with terror. Gunshots echoed in the distance.

 

Ellen curled up behind a dumpster in the alley behind her home, prayers running though her mind. Prayers that she hadn’t recited since she was a child, since before this madness had become law.Her fingertips were raw, the nails shredded from where she had tried to claw her way through the plywood barricading a window. She didn’t care about her fingertips though. The pain from the bullet wound in her belly was all consuming. Someone had shot her as they drove by. They had laughed, called her a dumb bitch. She remembered that as she shivered in shock. 

A familiar jingle made her lift her head. A stranger, clad in a long black coat, stood over her. Mr. Boots was in his arms. The man scratched at the underside of the cat’s chin and Mr. Boots leaned into it, eyes closed in pleasure at the skritching. The stranger looked down at her and then up at the scratched, bloody plywood in the window above her. “This was your home.” 

Ellen nodded. It was hard to choke out words through the pain. “He—locked me— out.” The stranger’s hooded eyes narrowed for a moment then he stepped closer. He knelt down next to the dumpster, the smell of garbage and blood was oppressive and thick. Mr. Boots rubbed his whiskery face against Ellen’s cheek and struggled to be released. The stranger let the cat go and Mr. Boots curled up beside Ellen. 

“You are dying.” The stranger said and Ellen nodded again, it was obvious. She wasn’t going to survive this horrible night. There were too many hours left, no way she could get to an emergency room. She was going to be a dead body that someone stepped over on their commute tomorrow. 

“Do you want me to end your suffering?” Her eyes sprung open wide in shock and he offered her a thin sad smile of reassurance. “It will be quick, painless.” He glanced up at the red claw marks in the plywood and back down at her ruined fingers. “I promise.” In the darkness, her vision wavering from slow, inevitable blood loss and pain, the stranger’s eyes seemed to glow green. She nodded in consent and he brushed back her hair from her eyes with a tenderness she had not felt from a man’s touch in so, so many years. 

“Angel?” She whispered the word as both a prayer and a question, as he leaned close, parting his lips. Ellen wasn’t afraid as he held her. The bite was indeed painless, the ensuing darkness was eternal relief.

 

He covered up the woman in the alley with her apron, her arms crossed upon her chest and eyes closed in peace. Her cat sat next to her body and hissed at him when he tried to pick it up again. “Suit yourself,” he said to the fierce black furball as he shouldered his rifle. 

He slipped from shadow to shadow, avoiding the bonfires that dotted the hellscape that was downtown. He hadn’t meant to be there, the car he’d stolen had run out of gasoline on his way to his lair. If he moved quickly, he could make it to a secondary lair, but he had to move. Moving fast took energy, energy took food. He licked the last trace of blood from his lips.

A school bus full of heavily armed howling Purgers careened down the street, he took a different alley to avoid them. Screams. So many screams. He wanted to cover his ears, the screams of terror brought back horrible memories of a very, very long time ago. Eventually they dwindled into whimpers and the stranger moved on, a loaded pistol in his hand. Men could be avoided. Sunrise was inevitable. 

The rumble of a huge tractor trailer truck and the hissing of air brakes caught his attention. He watched as an organized squad of armored killers kicked down the door to an apartment complex. Their leader wore mirrored sunglasses and a plastic apron to shield himself from splatter, he grinned behind the biggest gun the stranger had ever seen. This man wasn’t a Purger. This man was an _executioner_. 

More screams. So many screams. Gun flare flashed in unboarded windowpanes. The stranger began to move away, this was bigger than he could handle. “Keep moving.” He chanted to himself, “Keep moving.” A mantra of survival. Then he froze as a woman and a girl were dragged from the building by their hair, kicking and screaming. They fought like wildcats, thrashed and they clung to the streetlamp before they were ripped way and presented to the executioner with mirrored eyes.They stared up at the killer in terrified defiance and the stranger in the black coat took a step towards them— 

_His wife, his child— dragged from their cottage— fire! Oh God so much fire— He couldn’t get close— he couldn’t save them— HE COULDN’T SAVE THEM—_

He was running and shooting, not thinking about anything other than the memory of the smell of charred flesh and destruction. The executioner’s minions dropped as he pumped them full of bullets in his rage. The executioner fell, his head bleeding and sunglasses cracked as the stranger fired his last bullet. 

It was silent aside from the panting of the terrified women and the stranger took a moment to run his tongue over his teeth, to retract the fangs that had sprung during his blood lust. He couldn’t leave them there. They weren’t safe. He turned to them, nodded his head to the side. “Come with me.” And to his relief, they did.


	2. Chapter 2

“I need to get a car,” he said as they stuck close to the side of the brick buildings in the financial district. “I have somewhere I need to be before sunrise.” 

“Where?” The girl asked, endlessly curious. “Why?” 

“4031 Haywood Place.” He replied as they passed in front of a row of bank teller machines. It was one of his lairs, sealed against the sun and lined with precious native soil that kept him sane, kept him human. “It will be safe there.” 

“I know someone who has a car.” The woman said, “We could go to her place.” 

He nodded. He could leave them there. Move on. His stomach growled. The girl smirked up at him with the fearlessness born of youth. “Hungry?”

“Always.” He glanced up at the rooftops and urged them to stay close. “Snipers,” he explained before the girl could ask. “Hurry.” 

Silence for a few minutes but then the girl said, “I’m Cali. That’s my mom, Eva. What’s your name?”

Which name should he give her? There had been so many over the years. Aliases and false histories to be shed like drops of rain. Names had power, he knew that. He chose his first name, the name he associated with long lost happiness. “Leo.” Cali gave him a big smile and Eva echoed it after a moment.

“Why were you out here?” Cali asked, her gaze falling upon Leo’s weapons. “Were you Purging?” One night of destruction versus several lifetimes of death… he didn’t really have the moral high ground, but he didn’t want to see judgement in her eyes. Eyes that reminded him of happier, more innocent times.

Leo shook his head. “I ran out of gas. Keep moving.” His stomach growled again and mercifully Cali didn’t mention it again. 

 

Eva called up to her friend and Leo held his breath out of habit. He’d had sanctuaries ripped away from him before and on much less auspicious nights. The service door opened and a woman beckoned them inside. “Come in! Come in!” 

The apartment was warm and well lit, filled with the aromatic smells of a feast. No matter how horrific the holiday, humans would feast upon it. That hadn’t changed over the centuries. He could smell alcohol upon the breath of their benefactor, Tanya, as she introduced them to her family. More faces that blurred together, short tiny lives that would be over in a blink, in a heartbeat compared to his. 

“Excuse me.” Leo said. He went to the restroom, slapped some cold water on his face and looked up into the mirror. He couldn’t see his face, but he could see the droplets of water that ran down the contours of his gaunt cheekbones. Hunger clawed at the pit of his stomach. He needed to feed before his more feral impulses set in, before he lost the ability to choose a victim and lashed out. 

He heard yelling from the living room. Gunshots. He rushed to their aid, dodged a shot to his head, stepped over Tanya’s body as her sister ranted and raved about her _right to Purge_. Leo lunged for Eva and Cali, pulled them to safety outside the door, one under each arm. He went fast, fast enough to blur down the stairwell. He collapsed behind the neighboring building, dropping the women on the ground.

“What the hell was that!?” Cali squeaked, “How did you do that?” 

“Adrenaline.” Leo peered around the corner, the heavily armed squad was back. They rolled up in the tractor trailer and when the tailgate dropped, Leo saw the executioner. He had a bandage on his head. _Shit._ “We gotta move.” A heavy thunk against Leo’s head, a shriek from the girls and darkness. 

 

_“Wake up Leo.” The voice of his beloved. “Wake up.”_

_“You’re not real. You’re dead.” Leo said, squeezing his eyes tight to hold back tears that should have dried up centuries ago._

_“You have to help them.” Soft fingers stroking his hair. “Wake up Leo.”_

 

Leo cracked open his eyes. They were in the back of a truck, secured with other hapless victims. His head was in Eva’s lap. “Why don’t you just kill us now?” Cali snapped, still full of fire and tried Eva pulled her daughter closer. Cali shrugged off her mother’s grip.

“We ain’t Purging. We’re gettin’ paid.” A young man in a skull mask tipped back his disguise and fanned a thick stack of bills. Cali tensed and Leo touched her wrist. 

She looked down at him and the relief on her face was palpable. “Glad you’re back. You lost a lot of blood.”

Leo’s stomach cramped in response and he grimaced at the sharp stabs of hunger. The close confines of the truck concentrated the scent of blood, so much blood. He needed to drink from the source, needed that spark of life that flowed along with the blood. Blood licked up from the floor was nothing more than red water. Normally, he’d feed on animals, the vermin that came out at night. So many frightened heartbeats thundered in his ears, made his mouth water. 

“They’re worse than the Purgers.” Cali said none too quietly, “That’s blood money. They’re monsters.” 

Leo froze at her words. _If they were monsters, he was a nightmare._

The boy snorted. “Monsters that ain’t gonna die tonight.” He pulled his skull mask back over his face. 

One by one they were pulled out of the truck by heavily armed men in black suits. Leo was the last and he stood defiantly in front of the largest man. The snub nose of a small caliber machine gun pressed against Leo’s forehead and Leo’s lips curled in a smile. The hunger was making him reckless, but he heard Cali and Eva in the darkened room behind him and he let the guard push him into the room. “Don’t say a word or you die.” He was pushed down to his knees beside Cali. 

It was a stage. Complete with lights that blazed up, made him wince from the brightness. He’d seen this before, in another life. It was an auction. A goddamned auction. The auctioneer prattled on about the quality of the captives on stage, as if they were cattle primed for the slaughter. He stared back at the gaudily dressed rich people in the audience, drinking and feasting, a steely-eyed statue promising vengeance. The price went up, they were the last lot of the evening. That meant that dawn was coming. Fangs sprouted from Leo’s gums, curled down into his mouth.

The hunting ground was a warehouse dotted with plaster statues and columns, a simulacrum of an old plantation estate. There were even gurgling fountains, complete with pennies for luck. Leo drew his friends close, hid them behind a fake hedge. The lights snapped off, leaving them in pitch blackness. The announcer rattled off a list of weaponry that their hunter were equipped with, her voice dripping with awe and desire for the instruments of death. 

“Night vision!” Eva trembled, “They’ve got night vision!” 

Leo felt the corners of his mouth pull back in a thin grim smile. “Stay here,” he warned. 

Cali grabbed his arm. “You can’t go out there—!” She gasped in horror as Leo looked at her, his eyes glowing unearthly green in the darkness. “What are you?” 

“A friend.” Leo said with sad acceptance. “Stay there.” And with that, he dashed off into the darkness. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Italics mean a memory, a flashback.

The Purgers had countless weapons, night vision goggles and every advantage. Blood thirsty spectators clad in jewels peered out from above in an observation deck. A modern colosseum with gladiators and martyrs battling for survival, the entertainment of the rich. 

Leo could feel the sunrise prickle in his bones. He had to get to his lair. He had lost the small pouch of native earth he carried earlier in the evening, the soil that kept his many, many memories organized and separate in his mind. There was more in his emergency lair. A wide leather bracelet stuffed with dirt was all that kept him from deteriorating into bestial savagery. 

Hunger burned in his throat, his fingers curled into clawlike hooks and he lunged _._

 

_A brace of rabbits over his shoulder. A good hunt. Cold wind ruffled through his hair and Leo set back towards his home. The warmth of the hearth and his wife’s arms would banish the chill from his bones._

_A woman’s scream. Leo’s fingers clutched the hilt of his hunting knife and he rushed towards the sound. A noblewoman collapsed on the ground next to her carriage. Leo leaned over, listened for the signs of life. As his ear touched her chest, her arm snaked around his neck._

_“Aren’t you a pretty one.” Her grip strong as iron bands, her mouth wet against his throat as he thrashed. “I shall keep you.”_

 

One down. Leo wiped at his mouth with the back of his hand and ducked behind a topiary. He didn’t have to time to feed properly, only to whet his ravenous appetite with a sip of blood. There were more of them out there and for the first time in his long, long existence Leo felt _alive_. 

 

_“I do not want you.” Leo said for the hundredth time, as if what he wanted mattered to the cruel creature who straddled his waist, her long blonde hair trailing across his chest like pale ribbons._

_“You will.” The Lady replied. “Go fill this with dirt from the floor of your hovel in the woods.” She dropped a bag upon his chest._

_Leo’s stomach cramped, an unfamiliar hunger gnawed at his guts and gurgled. That noise seemed to please the Lady. She slid off of him, all silks and satins, clad in menace. “Go now. Return before the sunrise. Or you shall perish.”_

_Leo pushed open the door to his home, firelight spilled out and illuminated his blood-soaked clothing. His wife, his beloved, rose from her seat next to the hearth. Her face was lined with tears and worry and she held open her arms. He could smell her life, smell the delicious vitality that coursed through her veins. The second life that flickered in her belly._

_He took a shaky step towards her and then fell to his knees, his hands clawed at the ground and scrabbled up enough dirt to fill the leather pouch. He secured it at his waist. “I must go.”Leo’s voice cracked with sorrow. “I— I will be back. At dusk. Pray do not ask me why.” He ran from his home, unfamiliar razor sharp teeth sprouted from his gums and cut into his lips._

_The Lady was waiting for him. “You did not feed.” Leo glared, hatred crackling in his gaze. “It would have been easier. Just remember that my pretty one.” She gestured to a curtain and Leo flicked back the fabric. A bound man slumped against the wall. “One of the bandits that attempted to rob me.” Her hand clamped on the back of Leo’s neck and pressed his mouth against the bandit’s filthy skin. “Feed or perish.”_

_Leo resisted, then closed his eyes. He had to survive, he had to for his family’s sake. It would be well, he lied to himself, he could pretend to be human. No one would know, he could pretend… He sank his teeth in and the Lady petted his hair, cooed soothing noises of praise and approval._

 

The Purgers weren’t going to show any mercy to their victims, so Leo showed them none in return. He dodged the blast of a shotgun, rolled behind a fountain and then sprang up to rip out a throat. The Purgers blended together into a faceless, pale horde as Leo tore through them, fragile as misshapen paper dolls. 

 

_“I know what you are doing, my pretty one.” The Lady ran a comb through her hair. Leo continued mending his snares at her feet, kept his eyes averted from hers. “Sneaking off to play house with that woman. It won’t work. You should have either eaten her or let her mourn your death.” Leo said nothing. “And now there is a child. Don’t bother to deny it. I can smell it upon you.” Leo’s fingers stilled as she stroked the nape of his neck. “Enjoy your little game while it lasts. Nothing human ever lasts as long as we will.”_

 

She would have loved this night, Leo thought, as he crushed a man’s skull beneath the heel of his boot. He grabbed a dropped machine gun from the ground. The Lady would have been up in that box, cheering the mayhem and chaos. Instead of feeding, he sprayed the thick glass with bullets of contempt and threw down the gun once he had emptied the clip. They sent in security forces in response to his action and Leo fell back to Eva and Cali.

They stared with wide eyes at his bloody mouth and hands. Leo shrank back, ready to flee into the darkness, into safety from their horrified gazes. Gunfire peppered above their heads and they heard a shout, a cry of defiance. “The Resistance!” Cali cried out, “They’re here!” 


	4. Chapter 4

Leo collapsed against the side of an expensive SUV, the occupants screamed as he ripped open the door and pulled the driver out. It was the auctioneer, she trembled in fear as Leo opened his mouth and light glistened off his fangs. 

“Leo!” Cali clutched at his arm and Leo choked back his urge to feed. “We gotta get out of here!” 

They piled into the vehicle and just as Leo shut the door he hissed at the auctioneer. “I won’t forget.” _He couldn’t forget. Even if he wanted to._

“4031 Haywood Place. 4031 Haywood Place.” Leo muttered over and over, a prayer of hope. The sun was so close. 

“What is at 4031 Haywood Place, Leo?” Eva asked with soft concern. “Why do we have to go there?” 

“Safety. Safe place.” Leo gripped the steering wheel so tightly it creaked beneath his red-stained fingers. “Have to get out of the sun. Need my native soil. It’s in a— leather cuff. Can’t— can’t lose my mind. So hungry, so hungry, can’t feed— can’t feed— can’t feed on _you._ ” Leo gritted his teeth, fangs cutting into his gums. 

“Pull over.” Eva ordered. “You’ll kill us all if you drive in this condition.” Leo nodded, resigned to his fate. He pulled onto the shoulder of the road, stepped out and gazed at the horizon. They couldn’t see it, but he could. The first rays of dawn. 

 

_“I can’t remember the last time I saw you smile, my pretty one.” The Lady complained, peevish with boredom. “You didn’t even feed on that girl I bought for you.” She adjusted her feather-festooned hat and held out her arms, “Well, is it on straight?” Leo nodded even though it was crooked to the left. “It’s as if you don’t want to be immortal with all this moping. I thought you’d embrace your nature after three or four hundred years, but your stubbornness is truly breathtaking.”_

_Leo fastened his cufflinks. “I’m not the one who refuses to cut their hair. It is 1922, after all.”_

_The Lady snorted. “Fashion is fleeting and fickle. Mark my words, in two or three decades my locks will be the height of style again. The only things that never seem to go out of style are your cheekbones.” She tapped on his face with red painted nails. Leo stared back at her with hooded, unreadable eyes. “I could have gotten rid of you countless times, but I’ve become fond of this face. Tell me, my sweet, are you fond of mine?”_

_“I will be with you until you see your final dawn.” Leo took her hand and kissed it. “That is a promise.”_

_She raised an elegant eyebrow. “A promise with double-edged meaning, I should think. At least you’ve stopped eating rats and stray dogs.”_

_Leo hadn’t. He’d just gotten more clever at hiding his meals. “We shall miss the moving picture show.”He opened the door for her._

_The Lady clapped her hands in girlish glee. “The title is_ Nosferatu _. How droll.” _ __

 

“Get in the car Leo!” Leo startled at Eva’s voice. “Get in the damned car!” Leo blinked in slow confusion, he’d resigned himself to being left on the side of the road. Surely they weren’t talking to him… “Get in the car!” 

“Come on!” Cali reached over, grabbed the sleeve of his ichor-caked coat and pulled him inside. He shut the door and Eva stepped on the gas. The GPS computer chirped directions and Leo stared at his hands. 

“How old are you?” Cali asked, her wide eyes full of curiosity. 

“I don’t know exactly.” Clotted blood matted the crevices of his fingernails. “I remember the Crusades.” 

“Jesus Christ.” Cali breathed in awe.

Leo’s lips quirked. “Never met him. I’m not quite _that_ old.” 

Cali shook her head, “No way. There’s just no way. This is crazy.” Leo sighed and she leaned in closer, “Where did you learn to fight like that?” 

“Picked it up along the way.” He popped the collar of his coat so she couldn’t look at him so intensely. “There is always fighting.” 

“As bad as this?” Cali asked, “Because this is really shitty.” 

“This is…” Leo paused and chose his words, “A memorable era.”

“Were you out Purging? Going out to have a picnic?” Her bluntness made him flinch and reminded him of the gnawing hole of hunger in his belly. 

“I ran out of gas.” He gazed out at the horizon. Precious minutes flew by, grains of sand in his hourglass. “Stranded out there.” 

“I’m glad you were.” Cali smiled at him. She knew what he was and she still smiled at him. “Thanks for saving us.” 

Her vitality, her warmth pulsed from her skin like intoxicating perfume, the sweetest vintage that could pass over his tongue. Leo pressed his forehead against the cool glass of the passenger window, screwed his eyes shut.

“You’re welcome.” 

 

_“You think you can leave me?” The Lady screeched. “After all these years, after all I’ve done for you?” She threw a vase at his head, it shattered against the door frame._

_“After all these years,” Leo put on his hat and didn’t look at her. “After all you’ve done for me. I don’t even know your real name. Your first name. Tell it to me.”_

_The Lady paused, taken aback. She rubbed at her arms, chafing them for warmth. “Surely, surely I must have told you.”Leo shook his head. “Of course I did. You’re just playing games with me now. It’s a joke, my pretty one.”_

_“You have always been The Lady to me.” He turned to watch her face. “You can’t remember your true name, can you?”_

_Her brow furrowed in anger and she snarled, “Of course I can! You just never deserved to know it!”_

_“That’s why you made me. Why you kept me around. I don’t forget, I can’t forget. Even though it threatens to drive me mad, I remember every moment. I remember all of it!” Leo snarled, “And now, I’m going to try to forget_ you _. Make yourself a new puppet, a new plaything.”_

_“I curse you!” Her hair hung around her face in limp hanks, dirty ribbons, blood dripped from her eyes in a mockery of human tears. “I curse your name!”_

_Leo picked up his suitcase, filled with his native soil and valuables he’d collected for this moment. “Can you remember it? What is my name, my Lady?” He stared at her with contempt. “I’ll stay with you if you can call out my name.”_

_She began to gibber curses in languages that he did not recognize and she finally stammered, “Of course I know it. Of course I do. It’s— It’s— damn you. Damn you!”She roared with fury and punched her hand through a table._

_Leo’s lips curled back in a sneer. “You_ never _asked me what my name was. After all these years, you’ve never asked for my true name_ once _. Enjoy the rotting of your memories. It was a mercy never bestowed upon me.” He shut the door behind him and strode off into the night._

 

“Wake up! Wake up Leo!” Someone shook his arm. Cali. It was Cali. Her name was Cali. He blinked blearily, senses numbed by hunger and the inevitable sunrise. “We’re here! Come on!” 

He fumbled a key from his pocket, his fingers couldn’t feel the metal and he dropped it. Cali picked it up and helped him from the car. He limped up the sidewalk, he had to lock himself away before he went feral from the hunger. He’d let himself burn before he bit either of them. 

Shots rang out. Slammed him against the door of his lair. Cali screamed as he crumbled and slid down the door. The executioner strode up the path and leaned over him, “Found you.” There was a bandage on the side of the man’s head from where Leo’s shot had missed. 

Leo felt the burning pain of the bullets, but the man had missed his heart. Deliberately, it seemed as the executioner began to speak. “It wasn’t hard to find you, there’s cameras everywhere and that car you stole had a security tracker in it.” His profound arrogance reminded him of the Lady and Leo snorted out a laugh that made the executioner’s eyes narrow. “You think this is funny? You broke one of the unwritten rules of Purge Night. Don’t be a _hero._ We’ve been trying to figure out who you are, _hero._ But you don’t stay in one place for long, do you? You’re a survivor and you gave it all up for that?” He gestured at Eva and Cali with a dismissive leer, “The Founding Fathers gave us this night to take out the trash, not to save it, _hero._ Nobody will ever know what you did tonight. No one will ever know your name.” 

Leo gurgled and coughed, he crooked his finger, beckoned to the executioner who leaned in close. “My name is _Leo._ ” With the last of his strength he grabbed the executioner about the neck and sank in his fangs. He drank deep and long, sucked down the life spark as the sun crept above the horizon and the sirens wailed. Purge Night was over. His life was over. His skin began to steam and Leo closed his eyes. 

“No!” He heard the women scream as if from a great distance across time, “Leo!” The voice of his beloved and even the voice of the Lady thundered in his ears. And he smiled into the darkness. 

__

Sunset, he felt it in his bones. Leo’s eyes flew open. How—? He held up his arm, his leather cuff was on his wrist. He sat up, remembering sunrise scorching and crisping his skin. He was in his lair. The windows blocked out and boarded, nothing but the barest of facilities. And there were two women, two _friends_ dozing on his secondhand couch. Eva’s breath stirred fine hairs on Cali’s forehead, her arms curled protectively about her brave daughter. Leo sat and watched them sleep, memorizing the lines and curves of their faces. 

Cali cracked open her eyes and held out her hand to Leo. He tentatively took it, held her hand as if it were made of spun glass and even more fragile hope. “You need a shower. Yuck.” He glanced down at his tattered and blood-crusted clothing. Cali was right. She closed her eyes and went back to sleep. Leo held her hand for a few moments longer and then placed it gently upon her chest. 

A shower. Some rest. Food for the ladies. Leo opened the door to his lair, shut it behind him and sat on the steps, gazing up at the full moon. He had a purpose, something to live for and that was more satisfying than mere survival. He ran his tongue over his teeth as a stray cat ran across the overgrown lawn. There was also a bit of unfinished business he had to take care of… 

 

Carl yawned. It had been a long day in the mortgage office, he’d had to stay until well after sunset. People were still offering him condolences on the loss of Ellen and he wanted to tell them to shove it. The mass grave option was pretty cheap, he hadn’t paid extra for her name to be on the memorial marker. She didn’t have any family who’d care. He’d never felt so free. There was that one secretary that was giving him the eye, maybe he’d see if she wanted to comfort the grieving widower. 

Carl glanced down the alley beside his home. He’d hired a couple of kids with a power washer to clean up the blood in the alleyway and on the front steps. They did a pretty good job. He pushed open the door and saw a little black cat streak across the hallway. That damned cat was back. Now he had to catch the fucking thing and toss it out. Just one more hassle. 

“Get over here you stupid fucking cat—“ Carl began and he stopped. There was a man clad in black shadows sitting in his living room, the cat on his lap purring contently. “Who the hell are you?”

The man scratched the cat under the chin and looked at Carl with startlingly green eyes that caught the light from the hallway lamp. “A friend of your wife.” Carl swallowed back his fear, tried to remember where he’d stashed his gun. “I’m here for her cat.” 

Carl couldn’t drop his gaze from those green eyes. They matched the cat’s eyes and something bestial shivered in the back of Carl’s brain. It shrieked _Predator! Run!_ But that didn’t make sense. The guy didn’t have a gun. He looked like one of those male models in a cologne ad with ridiculously styled thick dark hair. Half healed red gnarled burn scars marred the side of his face. Carl gathered up his courage and blustered, “Get out of my house!”

“Where is the cat carrier?” The man asked mildly, “I found the food and bowls. Some of the toys.”

Carl backed up into the hallway, opened the closet door and pulled out a pink soft-sided carrier. He tossed it at the man who snagged it out of the air.  As the stranger coaxed the cat into the carrier, Carl grabbed the shotgun hidden behind the coats. His hand clenched around the barrel and Carl felt the whisper of a breeze stir his thinning hair. The stranger was standing behind him. 

“How—?” Carl stammered. It was impossible to move that fast, his teeth chattered with panic. The stranger leaned into Carl, stubble scraped against Carl’s throat and Carl swallowed. 

“Purge Night is for cowards.” The stranger hissed in Carl’s ear. “I offered her a quick, painless end to her suffering.” And hot, searing pain flooded Carl’s body as the stranger sank his fangs into Carl’s neck. He held Carl as his knees weakened, wobbled and collapsed. Just as the light began to dim in Carl’s eyes, just as the merciful darkness crept into Carl’s mind,the stranger let him drop. He fell hard onto the carpeted hallway and the stranger with such sharp teeth loomed over him. “I do not think that I shall offer such courtesy to you. Your wife sends her regards.” 

Carl watched helpless from the floor, slowly dying, as the stranger picked up the cat carrier and a bag of supplies, then walked past him into the night. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading my rather indulgent plot bunny.


End file.
